“No questions.”
“Alright.” He snorted, stepping back, nodding to the room. I followed him, pulling Crescent in with me. Lucian's eyes were fixed on us, and I had to catch a growl on the way up my throat as they lingered on her.
I looked around, rational considerations of alliances flickering out for a depraved, feral fear that was rattling loose in my chest.
“Finnian will wait outside?—”
“No. You all go.”
It was a gamble, but there was no reason for anyone else to come in here, right?
“How long ‘til the doors unlock for the day?” I asked.
Sterling shrugged one shoulder. “Couple minutes.”
Not long enough. But maybe just long enough to keep Crescent safe.
The alphas left, and I made sure the lock clicked into place behind them, but we were in a room filled with scents that didn’t belong to us.
I sat on the one bed with the least scent of others—possibly the bed of the alpha who’d died in a bad rut brawl a few months back. I didn’t remember his name.
“Do you think they knew?” Crescent whispered.
I opened my mouth to lie but halted. Even without her scent, the context was clear. “You did so well hiding it,” I told her instead, cupping her cheek. That was the truth. She’d held herself perfectly. “If they knew, I don’t think they knew which of us it was.”
She frowned, and liquid gold irises held mine, as if she was unsure why that mattered.
It did, though.
I realizedIhadn’t even understood why until I focused on it like I did now.
If they didn’t know which of us it was, it gave me another chance at protecting her.
Charred and insane instincts were sinking their claws in, dragging my mind into chaos. I was becoming something else—more desperate than I’d ever even heard an alpha describe in the face of their omega in heat.
My mind flickered back to the last look Sterling had given me before the door closed.
I was being paranoid.
I took a breath, holding her closer, cycling through the nagging feeling and trying to puzzle it out.
Her breathing was picking up, and I heard her bite down a whine. She was fighting an agony I knew, and she was doing it with more strength than I’d have.
How could I not be paranoid?
She was the most precious thing in the world, shivering in my arms as she waited so patiently.
She trusted me perfectly—her imperfect mate.
The one about to let her down...
I wouldn’t let it happen.
“They’ll find them, right?” Crescent whispered, voice weak.
“They will.”
They had to.